That Place Where Reality Blurs
by DreamingIce
Summary: Small ficlets from Storybrooke (and Fairytale Land) throughout the series. Mostly looking at the Snowing family. Written as part of a 2012 shuffle challenge


So, I originally wrote these as part of a multifandom challenge this year - 10 songs from my iPod on shuffle=5 ficlets from various fandoms each month. Every month (Ending with 60 ficlets across some 30 odd fandoms!).

And, well 2012 has been a year of OUAT feels. Lots of them. Admittedly, some translated better than others...  
I still can't wait for the new eps in 2013!

So, Five little OUAT ficlets. Please Enjoy!

* * *

**January:**

**Title:** Parental Failings  
**Fandom:** Once Upon a Time  
**Character:** Emma Swan  
**Timeframe:** Immediately post pilot ep  
**Theme:**Mother Knows Best – Tangled Soundtrack

_Mother knows best,  
__Listen to your mother,  
__It's a scary world out there.  
__Mother knows best,  
__One way or another,  
__Something will go wrong, I swear!  
~*~_

Tossing around in the unfamiliar bed, she struggles to settle into sleep, the events of the last couple of days catching up with her and making her head spin.

She'd never really thought about what had happened to that baby boy from ten years ago. She had, maybe naively, placed her trust in the adoption agency to find him a good home away from the mess that was her life at that time. She'd certainly never thought about the possibility of the kid searching her out, let alone knocking at her door on her birthday wanting her help.

Emma let out another unhappy sigh. What drives a child to leave everything he knows to go on a wild goose chase to hunt down the woman who gave him up without so much as naming him? At first, she convinced herself she was taking the kid-_Henry_-back to get him out of her life, and away from the memories, the responsibility.

Then Regina came into it. She control the poor kid's life to the extreme, and the lack of love or even comfort in his small world of Storybrooke struck a chord in her heart. She'd never thought of herself in any way, shape or form to be maternal. So why was she so reluctant to leave this boy?

Regina's manner that only she knows best for Henry...

Emma knows damn well parents make mistakes. Hell, she's never really gotten over the mistakes of her own parents. And she doesn't want to remember the things that the foster system taught her about bad parenting.

Henry was being crushed by his adopted mother. And she couldn't leave him now. She was far from perfect, but surely she could still try to protect him, couldn't she? Even though it terrifies her.

Turning back over again, she eventually settled into an uneasy sleep, her dreams haunted with shadowy figures of knights and running through the woods.

* * *

**June:**

**Title:** Good  
**Fandom:** Once Upon a Time  
**Characters:** Emma Swan, Henry Mills  
**Timeframe:** "A Land Without Magic"  
**Theme:**Albertine – Brooke Fraser

_Now that I have seen  
__I am responsible  
__Faith without deeds is dead  
__Now that I have held you in my own arms  
__I cannot let go  
~*~_

It's a well known fact that Emma Swan is a messed up woman. She herself is painfully aware of this, and has built these walls around her emotions to protect herself.

This place is the first place she has felt... a sense of self. For once, she isn't the anonymous drifter. First, the town knew her as Henry's birth mother, then Graham's deputy, then now as Sheriff and Regina's rival. The walls have come down, almost without her realising it.

Henry has done this to her.

She never thought that this would be her. Being a mother (she actually feels like the title almost fits now).

When eighteen-year-old Emma Swan birthed her son, she was too afraid to see him, scared that she'd see the face of the man she had come to despise so much. But now, she looked at Henry, and she only saw this stubbornly _good_ kid, with his beautiful crooked smile. He has a faith in people—in _her_—that astounds her.

"_You can't take them, something bad will happen!"_

"_Something bad has already happened."_

How had she produced this unfailingly good-hearted, untainted offspring?

He's so still and pale in the bed, Emma wants to shake him, see him move. Tears are running unbidden down her face. She can't lose him. She's just fought a goddamn _dragon_. Henry _cannot_ _be dead_.

He is the only truly good thing she's done in her whole life. He deserves to _live._

"I love you, Henry," she chokes out as she kisses his forehead.

* * *

**September**

**Title:** Dreams of Magic and Cowards  
**Fandom:** Once Upon a Time  
**Characters:** Baelfire  
**Timeframe:** Lets say... pre-series in our world.  
**Theme:**Fire and Ice – Within Temptation

_You run away  
__You hide away  
__To the other side of the universe  
__Where you're safe from all that hunts you down  
~*~_

"_Coward! You Promised!"_

The dark-haired man bolts upright in bed, sweat dripping from his brow as the boy's voice, heavy with pain and betrayal, echoes in his head.

It's been years since he dreamed of that night.

Bae—or Ben, as he was known here—had tried so hard to put it behind him. As far as anyone here knew, he was Benjamin Forrest, an orphan who'd entered the foster system at fifteen, scraped up enough to enter college, and then the academy at Quantico.

He still isn't entirely sure how he managed to pass psych, though. Or the background checks, for that matter.

He gropes around in the dark for the lamp switch. Finding it, he flicks the switch, inspecting the room as the golden pool of light appears. It looks...ordinary. He shakes his head. What did he expect to find? The enchanted forest? That world was long gone for him.

But he couldn't shake the feeling of magic in the air. It made him uneasy—magic doesn't belong here. But still, the lingering sense from his childhood swore there was magic somewhere.

To his FBI workmates, Ben's disdain of magic is almost legendary. Of course, in this world, what people claimed was 'magic' was either dumb luck and coincidence, or charlatans preying off the vulnerable. Real magic was not something to trifle with, as the people of this world seemed to think it would be.

Someone had once asked him why he hated the possibility of magic.

It had been hard to answer sufficiently without sounding crazy.

"Because it's a form of power that can't be controlled. And nothing is worse than a coward with power, because he fears losing power like no one else," he'd said quietly. The person had still looked confused, but Ben could explain no more than that.

It would have been so much easier here if his father had kept his promise. Still a hell of an adjustment, sure, but he would have had his father back...

Ben shoves the thoughts aside viciously. Rumplestiltskin made his choice over a decade ago. He could not waste more time and energy on the man now.

* * *

**Title: **Brothers Unknown  
**Fandom:** Once Upon a Time  
**Characters:** Prince James/Charming  
**Timeframe: **S1 FTL, after the events of 'The Shepherd'  
**Theme:** Hymn – Immediate Music  
~*~

This whole thing makes him feel sick, truth be known.

He's barely had time to think about it all, but he already realises King George is far from sentimental.

He was brought in to replace his twin. The concept sits ill with him. He is now Prince James, heir to a throne he doesn't want, engaged to a woman he barely knows. (And accosted by an exile who he can't get out of his head, no matter how hard he tries.)

Has King George mourned his brother at all? Or was he too busy finding his adopted son's replacement? Worrying about the Gold the kingdom would receive from Midas?

He wanted to think that the King was mourning, for his brother's sake (otherwise, what kind of life had his twin known?), although he could see no such sentiment from the man externally.

James stared around at the opulent rooms he had been led to. It felt disrespectful to be here.

The strange thing, he mused, was that he had always felt like there was something... missing. He'd passed it off as waiting for that 'right girl', but suddenly he wondered if it was a brother he'd been missing all these years.

And now, they would never get to meet.

There are tears in his eyes when he snaps back into reality with the sound of a knock on the door.

He would have to find a way to mourn his brother. Somewhere no one else could see.

* * *

**October**

**Title:** Best Chance  
**Fandom:** Once Upon a Time  
**Characters:** Emma Swan, Snow White  
**Timeframe:** Lady of the Lake [2x03]  
**Theme:** The Sad Man with the Box – DW S5 soundtrack  
~*~

Snow is overwhelmed being in this room.

Emma can see it written all over her face, especially when she starts talking about all the things she would have done in this room.

Emma knows in her mind that Snow and Charming loved her, tried to give her what they had thought would be the best chance (and really, it's not like they knew what sort of world it was they were going to, so her lingering resentment was kinda illogical). But in her heart, there was still traces of doubt.

It was moments like this that reminded her that she'd lost just as much as anyone in Storybrooke. That she had been loved so deeply for such a short time, and then lost. She finds the welling of emotion in her chest uncomfortable.

The thought occurs to Emma that she has no right to sulk and be mad at her parents. Didn't she give up Henry so he could have his best chance too?

But reconciling her head and her heart is not that simple.

She has had to rely on herself for so long. She isn't used to having someone put her needs above theirs unconditionally, and it scares her a little.

But she finds, even as an adult, she's still craving it.

Just as much as she can read that Snow craves being able to be her mother.

Maybe this will work. Even with the messed-up aspects.

* * *

Thoughts, concrit and feedback all greatful received!

Happy New Year, everyone!


End file.
